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Biomes

A biome is a region in a world with distinct geographic features. A World can contain mutliple Biomes.

Examples of biomes are:

  • Meadows
  • Woodland
  • Tundra
  • Desert

A Biome specifies what sub-biomes and species spawn within its area. Area where a biome spawns is hand painted.

Painting Biomes​

Select Biomes tool from the toolbar and then select the Biome you want to paint with in the dropdown list. After that you can paint that Biome over the landscape.

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The visualization color of each Biome can be modified in the biome asset (Debug Color property).

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Sub-biomes​

Sub-biomes are smaller biomes inside the hand-painted biomes. The key difference between biomes and sub-biomes is that sub-biomes have a mask/material which allows for defining their placement procedurally.

As an example, you may have a "Mountains" biome with several sub-biomes:

  • Mountain Forest
  • Mountain Woodland
  • Mountain Grassland

Sub-biomes may be shared between Biomes. Ex: "Grassland" sub-biome could be used in "Tundra" and "Moderate" biomes. where each of these sub-biomes can share or completely replace spawned species.

You usually want to place your species in sub-biomes.

Placing species in Biomes asset is usually reserved for quick tests and throwaway maps. Sub-Biomes provide control which becomes important for setups with more than a few species.

Placement​

Sub-biomes may be placed procedurally (based on a number of inputs, such as hand-painted masks, textures, landscape weightmaps, etc).

Each sub-biome has a generation material mask where we define that logic.

The sub-biome with the highest value in the growth mask (in some area) will spawn over other sub-biomes.

When two sub-biomes output exactly the same growth value they spawn on top of each other (together).

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